Bakto Flavors Keeping Vanilla Growing with Vanilla 2013 Symposium

PublishedSeptember 4, 2013

While you may know Bakto Flavor for its delicious flavors and other baking essentials, you may not know that the company is a science-based organization that is passionate about spreading knowledge to make the world a more flavorful place.

Join Bakto Flavors November 5-6 for Vanilla 2013, the company’s seventh international symposium focused on the miracle orchid, vanilla. This meeting will address the economic situation of vanilla in different growing areas and the latest developments in vanilla research. The conference will be a meeting place for people involved in all aspects of the vanilla world, including academia, the food and flavor industry, brokers, vanilla producers and others.

Vanilla production is vulnerable to many threats, including diseases, low prices to the producers and low demand by buyers. Vanilla 2013 will focus on what is currently being done and what researchers and the vanilla industry need to initiate now to sustain production of the world’s most popular flavor.

The price of vanilla has recently gone up 10-20 percent, rattling vanilla experts and growers. However, the price has been historically low, and sustainability has been hard to maintain. Farmers need to be paid more in order to sustain their farms and maintain their businesses.

The Vanilla 2013 conference will also focus on understanding how the vanilla pod can accumulate such high levels of flavor compounds, which has so far eluded researchers. Richard Dixon’s group has recently generated very large gene sequence data sets from developing vanilla pods, and their investigation throws light on many aspects of vanilla metabolism. Furthermore, at Rutgers University, Dr. Belanger’s lab is examining the sequences from different developmental stages of the pod for genes involved in vanillin biosynthesis. Through this process, the “hunt” for the vanillin pathway genes is making huge strides.
For more information on Vanilla 2013, or to register to attend, visit www.vanilla2013.com.